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Do as I say, not as I do
Europe sets poor example on Kyoto AFTER repeatedly posing as global exemplars in the fight against global warming, the European Union's member-states need to take a long, hard look at the cold figures.
According to a new study, 10 of the EU's 15 signatories to the Kyoto agreement are on course to miss their target to reduce greenhouse gases by five per cent of their 1990 figure by 2008-2012. Indeed, the Institute of Public Policy Research says that Britain is almost alone in Europe in making progress towards fulfilling its Kyoto commitments.
Indeed, looking at the wider world, Britain's performance – achieved largely through the contraction of the coal industry – stands out even more.
Canada, for example, which played host to a major international
climate-change conference in Montreal earlier this month, says it remains fully committed to its Kyoto obligations. However, by the end of 2003, its emissions were up 24.2 per cent on 1990 levels.
Meanwhile, since 2001, a period in which greenhouse-gas emissions across the EU have increased, those from the United States have fallen by almost one per cent.
America may still be one of the world's worst
polluters, but it is increasingly clear that those who seek to demonise Washington as the saboteur of Kyoto are hardly leading by example. Yet there has been as much hot air emitted by these countries' politicians, in their exhortations to the world to take action, as by their pollution-belching industries.
Kyoto was never meant to be an excuse for the self-righteous among nations to preen themselves on the global stage while doing nothing concrete to meet their own grandiose pledges. Yet, as the date nears by which action is supposed to have been taken, it is increasingly clear that this is the case.
If Europe and Canada cannot back up their fine words with deeds, how can they ever hope to persuade the US of the worthiness of Kyoto? More to the point, how can they have any impact on China and the rapidly industrialising nations of Asia, whose projected emissions levels are likely to make the sacrifices made by countries such as Britain completely irrelevant?
Ulster's fugitives
Tories right to oppose IRA amnesties
IT IS ironic that at a time when the Conservatives are discomfiting Labour by offering support on issues such as education, Peter Hain should complain that he is not getting enough backing from the Tories over his stance on Ulster.
Bipartisanship between the principal political parties has, of course, been a crucial ingredient of Northern Ireland's peace process. From the days when Labour held its tongue as John Major established the first tentative dialogue with the IRA, to the signing of the Good Friday Agreement and its aftermath, when the Tories backed Tony Blair all the way, the two main parties have formed an admirable and productive consensus.
But it would be wrong for the Conservatives to stand by when they believe that Mr Blair is making fundamental errors. The fate of Ulster's so-called on-the-runs has become one of the most controversial issues in Northern Ireland and the Conservatives are far from being the only ones opposed to the Government's policy.
In proposing what are, in effect, amnesties for some of the most vicious and blood-soaked terrorists in Ulster's history, Mr Blair has even incurred the opprobrium of a nationalist party such as the SDLP. But perhaps more significantly, he has deeply offended the families of those killed in such outrages as the Enniskillen Remembrance Day bombing, who cannot stomach the notion of mass murderers being allowed to escape justice.
Mr Blair has achieved much in Northern Ireland, not least the apparent ending of the IRA's involvement in large-scale terrorism (its participation in punishment beatings and organised crime, however, is another matter).
The Prime Minister must now accept, however, that he has gone too far in appeasing republicanism. Mr Blair's IRA amnesties are in stark contrast to his robust response to Islamic terrorism and in opposing them, the Conservatives are not exploiting the issue, they are expressing the revulsion felt by all right-thinking citizens.
Curfew call
Blair sounds ever more desperate
THE major increase in control orders and curfews, reportedly being proposed by Tony Blair, is a measure of the Prime Minister's increasing desperation in the face of rising levels of anti-social behaviour.
In theory, the idea of prevention, rather than punishment, is sensible. Impose parenting orders during the first signs of bad behaviour and before a child commits an offence, runs the Government's thinking, and the problem should be nipped in the bud.
Whether the state is right to intervene directly in such a heavy-handed way, and bypass the courts which were once so effective in preventing the escalation of juvenile crime, is another matter, however.
And at a time when tagged offenders released from prison are re-offending at record levels, questions must be asked as to how these latest proposals, if properly applied, could be effectively enforced.
Mr Blair's gimmicks may still be effective at
capturing headlines, but until it is clear that they are also combating anti-social behaviour, the case for ever tougher-sounding crackdowns remains unproven.
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Saturday 11 February 2012
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